Error 1053 starting Web Deployment Agent Service

If you are getting error 1053 starting “Web Deployment Agent Service” (part of Microsoft Web Deploy or MSDEPLOY), below is a possible fix.

This is the error I got when trying to start Web Deployment Agent Service: “Web Deployment Agent Service” on some of my servers. The exact error message is: “Windows could not start the Web Deployment Agent Service service on Local Computer. Error 1053: The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion.”

In the System Events Log, there are these generic service start-up error messages:

The Web Deployment Agent Service service failed to start due to the following error: The service did not respond to the start or control request in a timely fashion.”

A timeout was reached (30000 milliseconds) while waiting for the Web Deployment Agent Service service to connect.

The fix for me was to uninstall any previous version of Web Deploy, then re-install the latest version (Microsoft Web Deploy 3.5), and choosing “Complete” at the “Choose Setup Type” page.